Gurman: Redesigned MacBook Air Delayed to Second Half of 2022, No New High-End MacBook Pro Likely Until Next Year

[tweaknmod]

MacBook Air 16” please!

Though many scoff at this idea, I don't think it's far fetched at all - if not 16", then maybe 15"?

The main reason I say this is Apple's pivot recently to giving people what they've been wanting for years. MacBook Pros with less focus on design and more focus on function (including ports ports ports), a lower-priced monitor (issues aside, for this little post), and a higher powered Mac Mini (basically the Mini Pro people have been asking for).

They are giving us the hardware we've been telling them we want. One of those things is a light MacBook - both in power and in form factor - but with a larger screen.

If they do release a larger screen MacBook (Air), they will sell like hotcakes - Apple knows this and, I believe, is happy to oblige.

 

[EugW]

Though many scoff at this idea, I don't think it's far fetched at all - if not 16", then maybe 15"?

The main reason I say this is Apple's pivot recently to giving people what they've been wanting for years. MacBook Pros with less focus on design and more focus on function (including ports ports ports), a lower-priced monitor (issues aside, for this little post), and a higher powered Mac Mini (basically the Mini Pro people have been asking for).

They are giving us the hardware we've been telling them we want. One of those things is a light MacBook - both in power and in form factor - but with a larger screen.

If they do release a larger screen MacBook (Air), they will sell like hotcakes - Apple knows this and, I believe, is happy to oblige.

Personally I think the market for a giant Air is similar to the market for a 12" MacBook. It certainly exists, but it's probably not big enough for Apple to consider it a way to generate a lot of profit, at least in the context of the current product line.

 

[svish]

Was expecting M2 to launch later during the year. So MacBook Air along with entry level MacBook Pro can be launched in October after the iPhone launch. iMac 24” with M2 will likely be next year only.

 

[Zdigital2015]

October/November 2022: M2 MBA, M2 13” MBP, M2 Mac mini

March 2023: M2 24” iMac

May/June 2023: M2 12” and ~14”-14.2” iPad Pro, the 11” Pro will be EOL’d.

October 2023: M2 Pro/M2 Max 14” and 16” MacBook Pro

March 2024: M2 Max/M2 Ultra Mac Studio

Nothing inventive here, simply following the already released dates and added two years.

I intentionally left out the Mac Pro as the niche is already too small to be worth the time predicting a release date much less an upgrade date.

 

[Student of Life]

Personally I think the market for a giant Air is similar to the market for a 12" MacBook. It certainly exists, but it's probably not big enough for Apple to consider it a way to generate a lot of profit, at least in the context of the current product line.

To be honest I think there is a greater demand for the 12, it would be the ideal re-imagining of what the Air was meant to be. Super thin, light and you can carry it anywhere and powerful enough for daily use. Its not a pro, its not a hybrid iPad with a magic keyboard, just a super thin elegant laptop. Depending on how much bezel they cut you can hav a 12.5 or possibly a 13 inch screen as well as a full size keyboard.

 

[EdT]

New MacBook Pros just came out. Nobody is expecting updates to them this year of next.

No, nobody is reasonably expecting a MacBook M2 upgrade, but no one has ever accused me of being reasonable. Or if they have then they were wrong.

 

[dalestrauss]

I knew someone would post that, but nope.

There is no M1 Pro option of course.

Welllllll...the current "min Pro" is the i7/32gb/512gb for $1899 while a $1999 Mac Studio gets you an M1 Max with 32gb RAM and 512gb SSD - I'd say that's definitely the Mini Pro replacement.

 

[name99]

October/November 2022: M2 MBA, M2 13” MBP, M2 Mac mini

March 2023: M2 24” iMac

May/June 2023: M2 12” and ~14”-14.2” iPad Pro, the 11” Pro will be EOL’d.

October 2023: M2 Pro/M2 Max 14” and 16” MacBook Pro

March 2024: M2 Max/M2 Ultra Mac Studio

Nothing inventive here, simply following the already released dates and added two years.

I intentionally left out the Mac Pro as the niche is already too small to be worth the time predicting a release date much less an upgrade date.

Not necessarily so.
Each stage of the M1, Pro/Max, Ultra release was delayed for deliberate reasons, both
- need to modify the software (Pro/Max required OS tweaks to deal with two P clusters rather than one; Ultra required even more modifications, especially on the GPU side)
- desire to maximize publicity by showing off something completely new and (mostly) unexpected

Neither of those will hold going forward. Rather, going forward, timing will be determined by other factors from the most obvious (TSMC and Foxconn capacity; desire to match the School and Christmas seasons for certain products) to the most idiosyncratic (if the big new feature of the next MBP is a screen update, well, it will be delayed if something delays production of that screen...)

 

[boak]

It will almost certainly always be M., M. Pro/Max, M. Ultra, in that order. Just look at the A.X chips lol

The new cores will be pushed to the highest volume devices first, and slowly tapered into lower volume devices.

 

[Allen_Wentz]

Add 400 to take the ram to 32gb. takes it right up to the studio. It’s close enough Apple won’t see the market for them to retool the mini. They also won’t devalue the M1 Pro by putting it in the mini ar 1299

same reason really why the keep a gulf between the 13” MacBook Pro and the 14” MacBook Pro.

Even if the Mini could tolerate the extra heat of full-on operation using 32 GB RAM (which would set the internet whiners off about how hot Mini runs...), Apple would be nuts to offer 32 GB in the Mini now that Studio exists as a (IMO perfect) midrange desktop box.

Studio allows Mini to be properly configured as entry level with entry level pricing. Mini should evolve down, not up.

 

[PrimeAesthetic]

Though many scoff at this idea, I don't think it's far fetched at all - if not 16", then maybe 15"?

The main reason I say this is Apple's pivot recently to giving people what they've been wanting for years. MacBook Pros with less focus on design and more focus on function (including ports ports ports), a lower-priced monitor (issues aside, for this little post), and a higher powered Mac Mini (basically the Mini Pro people have been asking for).

They are giving us the hardware we've been telling them we want. One of those things is a light MacBook - both in power and in form factor - but with a larger screen.

If they do release a larger screen MacBook (Air), they will sell like hotcakes - Apple knows this and, I believe, is happy to oblige.

I'm most def in that same camp of wanting 15/16" MBA. If they do a 15/16" MBA I will def be upgrading. If they don't then I'll happily sit on my M1 MBA for another year or two. If they provide a smaller one then the current MBA...why don't I just buy an iPad Pro with a keyboard attachment (imho)

 

[Joooeforlong]

F it, just bought a 2020 MBA refurbished from the Apple Store. I have a 16" M1 Pro through work that I can use if I need power, but needed something for personal work. If they drop the M2 anytime before October I'll be a little disappointed, but can't wait until fall for a new machine and don't need two Macbook Pros.

 

[warriors2017]

you are wrong. M2 Air and M1 or 2 Extreme for the Mac Pro on October it is coming

Both wrong. Apple will announce M2 Supreme and M2 Lite at WWDC.

 

[pacalis]

I hope the upgrade the Macbook Air form factor before kids go back to school. It doesn't need to be an M2, which is overkill and fine for a 2023 update (i.e. Apple is not Dell in it's heyday).

It would be VERY CRAPPY of Apple to milk one more upgrade cycle out of the pandemic by bumping the release to October. Kids are really coming back to school/ university in the fall and many would like a fresh new design to start. It would be nice to see some love come back into Apple (vs. the calculated lifecycle grind) and this could be a moment to recapture the imagination of young people beginning with a well timed new product.

I say this in the context of believing that the current form factors of the Macbook Air and Mac Minis are really out of step with other apple products. Especially when you consider the quality of the last two years of ipad design changes. The ipads are game changing products. Yet the MBA is only 0.2lbs lighter than a MBP (and 1.3lbs heavier than an M1 iPad Pro 12.9). The mini is really fat too. Hopefully switching off intel allows them to both to shed some girth in 2022.

Also, while the M1 is amazing (and well ahead of the competition), if they don't release until 2023, their silicon upgrade cycles would be about 3 years, which is no faster than Intel (when the company was functional).

 

[Tyler O'Bannon]

New MacBook Pros just came out. Nobody is expecting updates to them this year of next.

We definitely expect an update to them later this year (1 year after launch), or absolutely, most definitely next year.

 

[boak]

I hope the upgrade the Macbook Air form factor before kids go back to school. It doesn't need to be an M2, which is overkill and fine for a 2023 update (i.e. Apple is not Dell in it's heyday).

It would be VERY CRAPPY of Apple to milk one more upgrade cycle out of the pandemic by bumping the release to October. Kids are really coming back to school/ university in the fall and many would like a fresh new design to start. It would be nice to see some love come back into Apple (vs. the calculated lifecycle grind) and this could be a moment to recapture the imagination of young people beginning with a well timed new product.

I say this in the context of believing that the current form factors of the Macbook Air and Mac Minis are really out of step with other apple products. Especially when you consider the quality of the last two years of ipad design changes. The ipads are game changing products. Yet the MBA is only 0.2lbs lighter than a MBP (and 1.3lbs heavier than an M1 iPad Pro 12.9). The mini is really fat too. Hopefully switching of intel allows them to both to shed some girth in 2022.

Also, while the M1 is amazing (and well ahead of the competition), if they don't release until 2023, their silicon upgrade cycles would be about 3 years, which is no faster than Intel (when the company was functional).

Would you rather have the current design with free AirPods or a new design with no freebies?

 

[EugW]

Would you rather have the current design with free AirPods or a new design with no freebies?

Regardless of what design they have, I suspect they'll provide freebies with the edu promotion.

 

[boak]

Regardless of what design they have, I suspect they'll provide freebies with the edu promotion.

Unlikely. New devices have always been excluded from Back to School promo.

iPad Air was excluded in 2020.

 

[drdeez]

my girlfriend has the MacBook Air nov 2017 13"

she is looking to upgrade as her battery life is really bad on her MacBook Air

her work mainly is with excel / sending emails / web based stuff

is it worth waiting for the newest MacBook Air later this year ? will she be missing out on anything big? she is not a power user by any means.

or just go ahead and pull the trigger on current m1 air ?

thanks

 

[EugW]

Unlikely. New devices have always been excluded from Back to School promo.

No, definitely not always.

iPad Air was excluded in 2020.

iPad Air 2020 didn't even come out until mid-September. The promo was just about over by then. Anyhow, in 2020, NONE of the non-Pro iPads were eligible anyway.

 

[pacalis]

Would you rather have the current design with free AirPods or a new design with no freebies?

New.

They use the freebies to get people over the cognitive dissonance of buying an old computer to embark on their new journey. Delaying product releases until the fall is a detestable practice that I hope apple suspends this one year.

Frankly the iPad and pencil (Pro, but the new airs too) blows away the MBA in nearly everything the student does day to day.

The reason today's university students need a computer is that there are some occasional circumstances (i.e. test taking software, database cookies etc...) where iOS won't work.

 

[Realityck]

Both wrong. Apple will announce M2 Supreme and M2 Lite at WWDC.

Sounds like a beer commercial.

 

[Macative]

They're not delayed at all.

The M2 is going to be based on 4nm, and always was. M2 products will not roll out until after the A16.

 

[Christopher Kim]

Duh! Like who didn’t see that? It would have been really awkward to launch M2 alongside existing M1 series products.

If apple released a Mac Pro with a m1 extreme, and release a m2 around the same time, naming and marketing would be confusing for a customer. Your absolute best should have latest architecture available.

Agree with these sentiments - has been said many times, but I don't think it's delayed, was just the plan all along. I never understood the rationale of rumors saying Apple would release an M2 MBA when they hadn't even rolled out the rest of the M1 line (M1/Pro/Max/Ultra). Would just make for such weird marketing messages, and would be done completely unnecessarily.

Makes way more sense this way to get the full M1 lineup out, and then come out with the M2, in order of low>high-end.

The Mac Pro is the one thing that's a bit tricky, since it's truly a professional / non-consumer facing device, and it's coming at the end of this 2yr transition. I would not be surprised if they release this post-M2 MBA release, and jump directly to the M2 Ultra+. If they kept the Mac Pro with M1 Ultra+, I think there's a chance for potential buyers to be a bit miffed that despite number of cores, it would be based on the original M1 architecture...

Though many scoff at this idea, I don't think it's far fetched at all - if not 16", then maybe 15"?

If they do release a larger screen MacBook (Air), they will sell like hotcakes - Apple knows this and, I believe, is happy to oblige.

Personally I think the market for a giant Air is similar to the market for a 12" MacBook. It certainly exists, but it's probably not big enough for Apple to consider it a way to generate a lot of profit, at least in the context of the current product line.

Yes, I really think Apple will continue to keep the "need to pay up to get large size" philosophy, and keep the 15/16" laptop size only for the MBP line-up. A larger MBA might "sell like hotcakes", but it would also cannibalize potential 16" MBP buyers.

 

[EugW]

I’m betting on Mac Pro at WWDC.

As for my desired M1 Pro Mac mini, even if they do release it soon, I’m a little concerned it won’t show up in the edu promo. Apple has not always consistently included the Mac mini in the promo every year, whereas the iMac is always included.

The MacBook Air usually is included but not necessarily all models. For example in 2019 they included the brand new just released 2019 MacBook Air as well as the 2018 MacBook Air, but excluded the 2017 model. (Both the 2017 and the 2018 were discontinued on the day the promotion started, but only the 2017 model was excluded from the promotion.)